The Banking Executive Magazine - December Issue 2022

FIFA World Cup 2022 ISSUE 168 DECEMBER 2022 the BANKING EXECUTIVE 67 The selec- tion of South Africa in 2010, Brazil in 2014, Russia in 2018, and Qatar in 2022 to host the world's most watched sport- ing event was clearly based on the rise of e m e r g i n g e c o n o m i e s . Given the turn against global- ization, will such countries be selected again? The 22nd World Cup is under way, but who at the beginning of this century would have thought it might be hosted by Qatar? Yet here we are, and the only surprise is that it doesn’t feel all that surprising. Through-out the past six World Cups, hosted by the United States, France, South Korea and Japan, Germany, South Africa, and Brazil, many de- scribe the event as one of the most beautifully inclusive meetings of many different nationalities and cul- tures. The advent of the Fan Zones, which really took off following the 2006 World Cup in Germany, em- bodied this spirit. The link between football and the state of the world economy is appar- ent in the choice of tournament hosts. It is an inescapable fact that FIFA’s selection of South Africa in 2010, Brazil in 2014, Russia in 2018, and now Qatar, was based on the steady rise of so-called emerging economies during the first two decades of this century. The other two BRICS countries (a group com- prising Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) might well join the small group of hosts in the future. But given many major countries’ in- ward turn in recent years, are the days of even wanting to host the event numbered? Will aspiring emerging-market countries find it in- creasingly difficult to succeed in staging the world’s most watched tournament? Or, to the contrary, could the world soon shift back to a more contented, globalizing, and in- clusive international order? One might even ask a deeper question: is FIFA a leading or a lagging indicator of the world economy and the de- gree of globalization? Many believe that how the competi- tion progresses this year in Qatar and, crucially, how many of us watch the matches, might be the clearest early sign of the broader sig-